Fellini’s “8 1/2” (1963)

“8 1⁄2 is about the struggles involved in the creative process, both technical and personal, and the problems artists face when expected to deliver something personal and profound with intense public scrutiny, on a constricted schedule, while simultaneously having to deal with their own personal relationships. It is, in a larger sense, about finding true personal happiness within a difficult, fragmented life. Like several Italian films of the period (most evident in the films of Fellini’s contemporary, Michelangelo Antonioni), ​8 1⁄2 also is about the alienating effects of modernization.”